Mingei: the people's crafts

The philosopher Yanagi Sōetsu saw beauty in anonymous everyday objects, and Western designers came to Japan to learn.

In 1925 Yanagi Sōetsu coined the word mingei for the crafts of the people: anonymous, everyday objects made by craftsmen without ambitions to be artists. Together with the potters Hamada Shōji and Kawai Kanjirō he founded the movement, and the Japan Folk Crafts Museum opened in 1936.

The English potter Bernard Leach worked in Japan and in 1920 founded a pottery in St Ives with Hamada. The architect Bruno Taut lived in Japan in 1933–1936, and Charlotte Perriand travelled there in 1940 as an adviser on industrial design.